posted on October 25, 2000 12:46:20 AM new
Last week I won an auction on eBay. I immediately went into PayPal to send the money that was owed after receiving the email notification that I had won. I choose to have the funds withdrawn from my checking account and pay in the form of an E-check. I logged on, entered the information needed to send the funds and clicked the submit button. At that moment I was notified that "You account information has changed. Please verify that the information you entered is correct and click the submit button." I was presented with the information I had just entered and it was indeed correct so I clicked the button. A few minutes later I get 2 emails from PayPal that stated that instead of one $530 payment, I had sent 2 for a total of $1060.00. I immediately contacted PayPal and they explained that at the moment I was transferring the money, somebody had sent a payment to my account. This changed the account information which is why I was given this message. Now, in order to pay by e-check, PayPal puts a hold of that amount your sending on a secondary account which in this case was my X.Com credit card. What started as a $530 payment has now turned into a $2120.00 hold on both my bank accounts leaving me essentially broke just as the end of the month bills arrive. I have contacted the person I was sending the payment to and have received various excuses as to why he has not returned the money. PayPal sees it as an error on my part and they refuse to assist me in any way. The message given to me when the account info had changed stated nothing about the possibility of this sending out a second payment. It only asked to verify the information I had just entered and presented me with the information I had just entered which I had entered correctly. Questions: Can I hold the man that received the $1060 legally accountable if he refuses to return the money? Can I file criminal charges or would I have to travel to his state and file civil charges? Is there a way to sue him for return of the money without having to make a 1000 mile trip? Any help with this matter would be greatly appreciated

posted on October 25, 2000 06:34:18 AM new
Wow -- I can't help any, but I just wanted to offer my sympathies.

Once upon a time (when I still had a PayPal account, that is) I doublepaid someone because the info didn't show up and didn't show up and I thought it hadn't taken. Fortunately, it was nothing near the amount you're talking about AND my seller was more than happy to send the extra money back. I thought at the time it was a crock that PayPal offered no way to reverse such a transaction, and still do frankly. Of course, none of this helps YOU.

Hopefully PayPalDamon will wander through here and be able to help you. That seems to be users' only option when one of PayPal's policies rises up and bites them on the behind.

posted on October 25, 2000 07:13:08 AM new
These errors happen more often than we hear about.
I've had several customers double pay me with PayPal. In most cases, I sent the money back before they even realized what had happened. In a couple of cases, the customer realized right away that they'd send payment twice and alerted me.

All of the double payments I received were small amounts.

Yours is not the first case I've read of a seller refusing to return a large payment that was sent mistakenly.

posted on October 25, 2000 07:29:13 AM new
PayPal's own terms of service covers the fraudulent activity of a seller receiving two payments on a single item and refusing to return the second erroneous payment:

"X.com, at its sole discretion, reserves the right to restrict an account for any one of the following events: The account has been used in or to facilitate fraudulent activity". [II.3.(10). Rights and Dislcaimers of X.com. Restrictions.]

posted on October 25, 2000 01:36:56 PM new
Thank you so much for your replies! Unfortunately this mess is getting bigger by the second. I called PayPal (customer service ext. no XX33 we will call her). Her reply was to withdraw everything from my checking account so the when PayPal attempted to make the withdrawal, the money would have to taken from X.com account which would at least allow me to hold on to the money from checking and have some funds available to me. I VERY specifically asked if this would cause any type of black mark with my bank and she insisted it would not. She told me that when PayPal checked the balance of my checking and found it to be sufficient, they would simply take the money from my X.com account. At this point I had asked for her name and extension number so I could reference her should this cause any problems. Oct 25... I checked my bank account information and found that ext. no XX33 was completely wrong with her statement resulting in 4 overdraft charges, overdraft protection charges and I would assume a VERY large black mark on my bank record. The $1100 hold on my X.com account has not been lifted leaving no money available on my X.com credit card and a large negative reading on my checking account. Of course its the end of the month and bills are due and no way to pay them. I spoke with X.com and they asked to have my bank records faxed to them so that they could make a decision as to whether they were to blame. Of course even if a miracle happens and they do decide they are to blame these funds will not be available for at lease several weeks. My bank blames PayPal so they will not assist me in any way.
Score: PayPal $2800.00 Me: -$2800 and a very negative banking record! HELP!

posted on October 25, 2000 03:25:42 PM new
Jimmy, you've now qualified this discussion for my list of URLs of *educational PayPal discussions* that I send interested trading partners when they want to know why I no longer use PayPal.